Z-Man Games is consolidating all their games to one warehouse and since the sale of Arimaa sets have not been as good as expected they will not be getting moved to the new warehouse. Zev has offered to sell the remaining 7800 sets to me at a very low price. The sets which aren't sold will be getting trashed. Even at the low price I won't be able to buy them all. If anyone is interested in buying some (in packs of 6) please contact me. I won't post the price here, in case someone wants to buy and resell these, but it's very good. http://arimaa.com/arimaa/contact/

I'm really sad to see this happening. I can understand Z-Mans situation though; they don't want to continue paying for storage if the sets aren't moving fast enough.

But they are brand new sets; I would much rather see them find good homes then getting trashed. If anyone has any ideas on how to save them, please post.

Ah this is sad indeed. If 10000 were manufactured and 7800 remain, surely less than 2000 were sold, with the remainder being given away for promotion. Back-of-the-napkin math says ZMan has lost over thirty thousand dollars from his foray into Arimaa. I hate to see someone who believed in Arimaa and supported Arimaa lose so much money because of it. Thank you ZMan! Sorry it didn't work out!

Omar, let me guess that, if you are hoping for anyone to take shipment of any significant number of these orphaned sets, you would at least have to grant them the right to resell in any way and at any price.

But they are brand new sets; I would much rather see them find good homes then getting trashed. If anyone has any ideas on how to save them, please post.

BTW: I have to let Z-Man know by June 1st. So time is short.

It’s really disappointing to hear that not only have sales been poor but that the sets will be destroyed I’ll buy a couple dozen games (or more if they’re really cheap) and give them to local schools. If a bunch of pre-teen Torontonians join the next World Championship then I’ll feel proud to have done my part

It's too bad there wasn't a bit more time left. A Dutch auction running over a period of a month seems like it would have been a good way to try and distribute a good number before needing to dispose of the rest.

I'm disappointed I missed this opportunity, but I'm curious how successfully saving copies of Arimaa were? I was thinking how somebody getting multiple copies of this could actually help promote Arimaa by hosting a local Arimaa tournament somewhere public to spread awareness.

I expect that in the long run, the fact that Z-Man is no longer selling Arimaa sets will make them hard to come by. In the short run, however, it hasn't happened yet. On Board Game Geek, I have a watch on Arimaa. An Arimaa set seems to be put up for sale or trade every couple of weeks. From this I infer that there is still plenty of supply of Arimaa sets floating around out there for anyone who wants to set up a club or acquire one for whatever reason.

Thanks to some relatives that helped out. I was able rescue all the sets.

Wow, that's great news for Arimaa! The existence of physical sets definitely helps popularize the game. Playing Arimaa on a chess board gives the impression of Arimaa being a chess variant, which is a net negative. The more Arimaa sets are in circulation, the more folks will take Arimaa seriously in its own right.

The only downside is that someone is on the hook for a lot of money. I hope you and your relatives don't take it on the chin. I still believe that Arimaa could bust out at any time and become a huge fad. The game itself is not played out, the Challenge has not been won, and the elements are there for Arimaa to be "discovered" by society at large and enjoy a popularity explosion. If that ever happens, it will be nice to be sitting on a big pile of sets.